Aldama Elementary Green Team

Highland Park

Tricia O’Connell of Terra Soma Landscape Architecture co-founded the Green Team at Aldama Elementary in Highland Park with three other parents when her son started the dual language program there in 2018.

She has worked with the Green Team since then helping run community outreach programs and creating a conceptual Master Greening Plan through a grant with the National Park Service, and designed their SEEDS garden, which was awarded a $100,000 grant through LAUSD’s Office of Sustainability and is in their queue now.

Tricia worked with Green Schoolyards America in the early days of the Covid-19 pandemic to identify spots for outdoor education. She designed, project managed, and helped paint several campus and neighborhood improvements, including designing the alebrije-themed storage bins (and painting the hawk one), the TK tricycle path, a Fall Fiesta backdrop, and the indigenous woven huipul-inspired design on the public steps on Montezuma Street across from the school, with cleanup and paint provided by Councilmember Gil Cedillo’s office.

She also designed and oversaw installation of the native Hawk’s Nest planting space in 2024 with habitat plants from the Xerces Society. The Green Team lobbied LAUSD to install DG in an asphalt area where bungalows were removed in 2019 instead of replacing the old asphalt with new asphalt. Four Tipu trees from North East Trees and logs from Angel City Lumber were generously donated to create a hands-on shady play space in a corner of the campus, and two Oaks were installed nearby in an available planter.

The Hawk’s Nest area received 100% native plants in 2024 and is being tended to by the Green Team, student-led Mini Green Team, and the California Climate Action Corps fellows, who bring wonderful educational programming to the school.

Tricia has participated in countless campus cleanups and greening efforts with a truly dedicated group of parents, grandparents, and students and is so proud of the entire Green Team and extended Aldama fam for all they have accomplished!